India Falls To 101 From 94 In Hunger Index Behind Pak, Nepal: Report
Global Hunger Index: "People have been severely hit by COVID-19 and by pandemic related restrictions in India, the country with highest child wasting rate worldwide," the report said
India has slipped to 101st position in the Global Hunger
Index (GHI) 2021 of 116 countries, from its 2020 position of 94th and is behind
its neighbours Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal.
Eighteen countries, including China, Brazil and Kuwait,
shared the top rank with GHI score of less than five, the website of the Global
Hunger Index that tracks hunger and malnutrition said on Thursday.
The report, prepared jointly by Irish aid agency Concern
Worldwide and German organisation Welt Hunger Hilfe, termed the level of hunger
in India "alarming".
In 2020, India was ranked 94th out of 107 countries. Now
with 116 countries in the fray, it has dropped to 101st rank. India's GHI score
has also decelerated - from 38.8 in 2000 to the range of 28.8 - 27.5 between
2012 and 2021.
The GHI score is calculated on four indicators --
undernourishment; child wasting (the share of children under the age of five
who are wasted i.e who have low weight for their height, reflecting acute
undernutrition); child stunting (children under the age of five who have low
height for their age, reflecting chronic undernutrition) and child mortality
(the mortality rate of children under the age of five).
The share of wasting among children in India rose from 17.1
per cent between 1998-2002 to 17.3 per cent between 2016-2020, according to the
report.
"People have been severely hit by COVID-19 and by pandemic related restrictions in India, the country with highest child wasting rate worldwide," the report said.
Neighbouring countries like Nepal (76), Bangladesh (76),
Myanmar (71) and Pakistan (92) are also in the 'alarming' hunger category but
have fared better at feeding their citizens than India, according to the report.
However, India has shown improvement in other indicators
such as the under-5 mortality rate, prevalence of stunting among children and
prevalence of undernourishment owing to inadequate food, the report said.
According to the report, the fight against hunger is
dangerously off track. Based on the current GHI projections, the world as a
whole - and 47 countries in particular - will fail to achieve a low level of
hunger by 2030.
Food security is under assault on multiple fronts, it said,
adding that worsening conflict, weather extremes associated with global climate
change, and the economic and health challenges associated with the COVID19
pandemic are all driving hunger. "Inequality -- between regions,
countries, districts, and communities -- is pervasive and, (if) left unchecked,
will keep the world from achieving the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG)
mandate to leave no one behind," the report said.
Further, the report noted that it is difficult to be optimistic in 2021 because the forces now driving hunger are overpowering good intentions and lofty goals. Among the most powerful and toxic of these forces are conflict, climate change, and COVID-19 - three Cs that threaten to wipe out any progress that has been made against hunger in recent years.
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